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THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW 
(IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA)



 
 
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  #31  
Old September 8th 18, 08:11 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Andre Jute[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 10,422
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW 
(IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA)

On Saturday, September 8, 2018 at 5:17:33 AM UTC+1, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 9/7/2018 11:24 PM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Friday, September 7, 2018 at 8:01:00 PM UTC-4, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 9/7/2018 3:42 PM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 9:42:25 PM UTC-4, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 9/5/2018 3:41 PM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:


Where I am there's virtually no talk about MANDATORY helmet laws.

IIRC, you're somewhere in Ontario. There's virtually no talk about
mandatory helmet laws there specifically because a group of cyclists -
including one who used to post here - successfully argued against them.
You should thank those cyclists for your freedom of choice.

BTW, a few years ago my wife and I did a driving and camping trip to
Cape Breton. While in a tiny town in New Brunswick, on a zero-traffic
Sunday evening, we rode our bikes a few blocks to a restaurant and back.
We were stopped on a residential street by a local cop and told that
helmets were mandatory for all ages everywhere in Canada. She was wrong,
of course. Yes, they are mandatory for all ages in NB and we knew that;
but we didn't even bring them along.

You'd be subject to the same nonsense if not for people you've argued
against.

--
- Frank Krygowski

Please show me where I argued against peoplec opposed to mandatory laws.

OK, Sir. You've obviously argued against me. You resurrected one of your
arguments just two days ago, starting with "Say that on this newsgroup
and within a post or two our resident anti-helmet poster will attack you
quite strongly." Was that not directed at me? If not me, it might have
been Tom.

Both Tom and I have argued against mandatory helmet laws, and we've
given reasons why. You've argued against us and argued against our
reasons. Therefore you you HAVE argued against people opposed to
mandatory helmet laws.

And I repeat: If not for the efforts of some of those same people, you'd
be subject to a MHL right now, just like the cyclists in New Brunswick..

--
- Frank Krygowski


BULL****! No where and at no t ime have I EVER stated that I am PRO mandatory helmet lawas. You are so anti-helmet that you can't even read a post about a helmet without you immediately foaming at the mouth and spouting that anyone wanting to wear a helmet has to be pro-mandatory helmet laws.


sigh Let's try again. You said "Please show me where I argued against
peoplec [sic] opposed to mandatory laws."

I showed where you argued against me, and I'm against mandatory helmet
laws. Therefore you DID argue against a person opposed to mandatory
helmet laws. And you have argued against others as well - including,
IIRC, a person who used to post here and who is largely responsible for
free choice of hat style in your own province.

Note, I didn't say you argued in favor of mandatory helmet laws. It
wasn't necessary to say that, because of your own phrasing of your "show
me" demand.

--
- Frank Krygowski


You're weaseling, Franki-boy. Not only is it unbecoming for a man of your age to attempt limbo-dancing, your attempts to escape the consequences of your lie is morally pretty despicable. It is quite clear from the context that Ridealot meant that he never argued against the work of the *Canadian* opposer of mandatory helmet laws, and that he invited you to prove different, on pain of you being called a liar. As I said already, your attempt at a sophistry, in declaring that Ridealot has argued against you and that you are against mandatory helmet laws and that constitutes proof of your slander, is pretty childish. Your further explanation debases even that low achievement to kindergarten debating tactics.

You should just have apologized for carelessly causing a misunderstanding and moved on. That would have been the right thing to do, and would have been the end of it. But you're a graceless clown who will never admit you're in error.

I think, Franki-boy, that unless you can show, and quickly since you've already squandered one chance, where Ridealot argued against the particular Canadian opposer of legally mandated helmets who also posted here, and that he argued against him on that particular matter of helmet mandation, Ridealot has proven his case against you and is justified in calling you a slanderer and liar.

For myself, I'm perfectly satisfied that you cannot provide this proof, and that you therefore are admitting by your weaseling that you slandered Ridealot with a vicious lie that can get him ostracized in many cycling circles..

You're a liar, Frank Krygowski. Worse, you're vicious.

Andre Jute
Frank-boy's lies are starting to seem like an addiction. I wonder what he's on.
Ads
  #32  
Old September 9th 18, 10:01 PM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
[email protected]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,261
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW (IN THE UNITED STATESOF AMERICA)

On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 5:25:13 PM UTC-7, AMuzi wrote:
On 9/6/2018 6:34 PM, wrote:
On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 9:03:22 AM UTC-7, Radey Shouman wrote:
Frank Krygowski writes:

On 9/6/2018 2:35 AM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 12:54:44 AM UTC-4, Tim McNamara wrote:
On Wed, 5 Sep 2018 12:41:29 -0700 (PDT), Sir Ridesalot
wrote:

Where I am there's virtually no talk about MANDATORY helmet laws.
However many motorists and BICYCLISTS would like to see bicyclists
licensed so t hat they can fined or charged whenever they hit someone
or do something stupid and illegal that causes or nearly causes a
vehicular accident involving a motor vehicle or other bicyclist. The

Bicyclists can already be charged for violating the law in all 50 states
in the US. No licensing necessary. Bicyclists (and others) may not be
charged for stupidity, on the other hand, because being stupid is not
against the law- unless said stupidity leads to breaking the law.

Also, many here want to see electric scooters/pedal bikes licensed too
since so many people using them totally disregard rules of the road
and city bylawas as to where such things can be ridden.

And yet a plurality if not majority of motor vehicle operators that I
see every day violate some law or other while I am watching- speeding,
changing lanes without signaling, driving while distracted, driving out
of the designated lane, speeding, failing to stop for stop signs and
traffic signals, speeding, nonfunctioning head/taillights, speeding,
etc., etc., etc. Licensing clearly does not result in compliance with
the law and, at least in my state, no actual competence to operate a
motor vehicle in traffic is required to get a license. All licensing
seems to do is create a false notion of accountability. Take people's
licenses away and they just drive without one.

What people here want is a means to identify bicyclists/bicycle
who/that leave the scene. Thus the wish for bicycle licenses.

There are countless cases of motorists leaving the scene of an
accident, usually followed by reports like "The driver was in a black
SUV. It may have some front end damage. Anyone with information should
call the local police..." There's almost never mention of a license
plate number, probably because they're so difficult to read quickly
and not easy to remember.

Now extrapolate to a license plate on a bicycle. How easily would it
be seen? How often would it make a difference?

We live in a brave new world, in which cameras that can read and
recognize license plates are sprinkled all over the landscape. This
allows governments to keep track of our movements in way that would have
been impossible not even a few years ago. Bicycle license plates would
allow the same benevolent oversight for cyclists as it does for
motorists.

Once facial recognition software is ready for prime time
pedestrians will enjoy the same benefits.


License plate readers are both rare and not very effective. There is virtually NO WAY that facial recognition would work. This is the real world and not NCIS.


Earth to Tom! Hello - ?? It's 2018 here.

Local automated license readers spot stolen cars here
regularly and facial recognition has gone mainstream:
https://www.iheart.com/content/2018-...gal-immigrant/



--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971


Andrew - Remember - I am an electronics engineer. I design these sorts of things and actually know how they are constructed and programmed. Can you say the same?

There is an entire world of difference between a license plate reader designed to identify a plate that is DESIGNED to be clearly visible and "Facial recognition" when entire racial groups can have almost identical main features. No matter WHAT you saw on NCIS these programs are only available to the strongest possible computers in the world. They will NOT run on mine and my desktop is among the top 1% in power in the entire world.
  #33  
Old September 9th 18, 10:15 PM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
[email protected]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,261
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW (IN THE UNITED STATESOF AMERICA)

On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 6:28:28 PM UTC-7, Radey Shouman wrote:
writes:

On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 9:03:22 AM UTC-7, Radey Shouman wrote:
Frank Krygowski writes:

On 9/6/2018 2:35 AM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 12:54:44 AM UTC-4, Tim McNamara wrote:
On Wed, 5 Sep 2018 12:41:29 -0700 (PDT), Sir Ridesalot
wrote:

Where I am there's virtually no talk about MANDATORY helmet laws.
However many motorists and BICYCLISTS would like to see bicyclists
licensed so t hat they can fined or charged whenever they hit someone
or do something stupid and illegal that causes or nearly causes a
vehicular accident involving a motor vehicle or other bicyclist. The

Bicyclists can already be charged for violating the law in all 50 states
in the US. No licensing necessary. Bicyclists (and others) may not be
charged for stupidity, on the other hand, because being stupid is not
against the law- unless said stupidity leads to breaking the law.

Also, many here want to see electric scooters/pedal bikes licensed too
since so many people using them totally disregard rules of the road
and city bylawas as to where such things can be ridden.

And yet a plurality if not majority of motor vehicle operators that I
see every day violate some law or other while I am watching- speeding,
changing lanes without signaling, driving while distracted, driving out
of the designated lane, speeding, failing to stop for stop signs and
traffic signals, speeding, nonfunctioning head/taillights, speeding,
etc., etc., etc. Licensing clearly does not result in compliance with
the law and, at least in my state, no actual competence to operate a
motor vehicle in traffic is required to get a license. All licensing
seems to do is create a false notion of accountability. Take people's
licenses away and they just drive without one.

What people here want is a means to identify bicyclists/bicycle
who/that leave the scene. Thus the wish for bicycle licenses.

There are countless cases of motorists leaving the scene of an
accident, usually followed by reports like "The driver was in a black
SUV. It may have some front end damage. Anyone with information should
call the local police..." There's almost never mention of a license
plate number, probably because they're so difficult to read quickly
and not easy to remember.

Now extrapolate to a license plate on a bicycle. How easily would it
be seen? How often would it make a difference?

We live in a brave new world, in which cameras that can read and
recognize license plates are sprinkled all over the landscape. This
allows governments to keep track of our movements in way that would have
been impossible not even a few years ago. Bicycle license plates would
allow the same benevolent oversight for cyclists as it does for
motorists.

Once facial recognition software is ready for prime time
pedestrians will enjoy the same benefits.


License plate readers are both rare and not very effective. There is
virtually NO WAY that facial recognition would work. This is the real
world and not NCIS.


Not too long ago I drove across a few bridges in NYC, there were no toll
booths, only cameras. They sent me a bill, based on my license plate
number. In my state (Massachusetts), they recently eliminated toll
booths, and explicitly tied the electronic toll dongles to a particular
car. The only way to enforce that is by using license plate readers.

Down on near the southern border all of the border patrol checkpoints
now have cameras with license plate readers. I'm fairly sure they work,
and that they're ubiquitous.

Facial recognition is a lot dodgier, but I wouldn't be surprised if it
eventually worked quite well, in the sense of doing what its users want.

--


They identify Mexican people by the province they came from because they have ubiquitous features.Telling my father from his two brothers would have been nearly impossible save for the differences in fat tissue. Even my younger brother 15 years my junior has a face very similar to mine (poor soul) and my dead brother and my dead brother's drug addicted son.

Now have the face turned slightly one way or the other the algorithm is so complex that it takes a hyper-super computer to achieve. This is NOT commonly available. Partially hidden features from a hat or mustache or facial augmentation and you have an almost impossible job. What you end up is someone like me designing a program based on CONCLUSIONS of some PhD. Remember when I said that I couldn't get a poison gas detector to work and it turned out that when I worked out the math that they had done it incorrectly? Engineers don't often use Calculus so I had to learn it from the ground up.
  #34  
Old September 9th 18, 10:26 PM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
[email protected]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,261
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW (IN THE UNITED STATESOF AMERICA)

On Friday, September 7, 2018 at 10:17:26 AM UTC-7, AMuzi wrote:
On 9/7/2018 10:54 AM, Andre Jute wrote:
On Friday, September 7, 2018 at 2:26:02 PM UTC+1, AMuzi wrote:

Indeed, in a related issue the winning phrase was, "Let
those who ride decide."


That could be the motto of old-fashioned capital L liberals like me.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sd-XHD_GuM



Andre Jute
How those intolerant thugs can call themselves liberals is entirely beyond me


Intolerant thugs? Harley riders are more likely union
welders, machinists or truck drivers than trailer trash.

http://www.latimes.com/business/auto...825-story.html


Hardly thugs. Sonny Barger whom I knew was an author of a number of books. He was also an actor with more movies to his name than most famous actors.

Many of the Hells Angels club were quite educated. It grew from being a club to being a gang a lot later than you would expect and the first crimes they got into were little more than drunken fights with drunken farmworkers. Who would you think would be at fault - Roger's son or some invading motorcycle club?
  #35  
Old September 9th 18, 10:28 PM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
[email protected]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,261
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW (IN THE UNITED STATESOF AMERICA)

On Friday, September 7, 2018 at 5:45:53 PM UTC-7, jbeattie wrote:
On Friday, September 7, 2018 at 5:10:36 PM UTC-7, Andre Jute wrote:
On Saturday, September 8, 2018 at 1:01:00 AM UTC+1, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 9/7/2018 3:42 PM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 9:42:25 PM UTC-4, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 9/5/2018 3:41 PM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:


Where I am there's virtually no talk about MANDATORY helmet laws.

IIRC, you're somewhere in Ontario. There's virtually no talk about
mandatory helmet laws there specifically because a group of cyclists -
including one who used to post here - successfully argued against them.
You should thank those cyclists for your freedom of choice.

BTW, a few years ago my wife and I did a driving and camping trip to
Cape Breton. While in a tiny town in New Brunswick, on a zero-traffic
Sunday evening, we rode our bikes a few blocks to a restaurant and back.
We were stopped on a residential street by a local cop and told that
helmets were mandatory for all ages everywhere in Canada. She was wrong,
of course. Yes, they are mandatory for all ages in NB and we knew that;
but we didn't even bring them along.

You'd be subject to the same nonsense if not for people you've argued
against.

--
- Frank Krygowski

Please show me where I argued against peoplec opposed to mandatory laws.

OK, Sir. You've obviously argued against me. You resurrected one of your
arguments just two days ago, starting with "Say that on this newsgroup
and within a post or two our resident anti-helmet poster will attack you
quite strongly." Was that not directed at me? If not me, it might have
been Tom.

Both Tom and I have argued against mandatory helmet laws, and we've
given reasons why. You've argued against us and argued against our
reasons. Therefore you you HAVE argued against people opposed to
mandatory helmet laws.

And I repeat: If not for the efforts of some of those same people, you'd
be subject to a MHL right now, just like the cyclists in New Brunswick.

--
- Frank Krygowski


Seems to me, Ridealot, that you're entitled to an apology the moment Krygowski fails to prove his lie that you are a cyclist sell-out to Big Helmet -- as he has failed to prove his lie: he accused you of arguing against *Canadian* anti-helmet campaigners but, now that you've stood up to him and demanded proof of his lie, suddenly Krygowski and Tom are standing in for Canadians, and by a tenuous leap of poor faith at that. It's crap, and cheap, transparent crap at that, not even worthy of a junior school debate.

Of course you won't get an apology, because Krygowski is far too smug (or more likely malicious) ever to admit he made a mistake. What you'll get is just more of the same ad hominem abuse from Krygowski.


Damn you again BIG HELMET! Can't you see, Andre, that BIG HELMET is tearing us apart -- pitting brother against brother? Cast off BIG HELMET! Free your head. Free your mind. We must all join arms, bare headed, riding together as one . . . into a giant crash. Do'h. I hit my head. It's really hard to ride arm-in-arm, unless you're the Sky Team. https://i.eurosport.com/2016/07/24/1...70-640-360.jpg

To listen to this drivel, you would think the Huns were massed on the border waiting to invade and enslave our heads. Wait until the electric scooters make it to Ohio, then Frank will have something real to complain about.

-- Jay Beattie.


I think that Andre doesn't understand sarcasm. Hey Andre, are you an American?
  #36  
Old September 9th 18, 10:56 PM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
AMuzi
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 13,447
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW (IN THE UNITED STATESOF AMERICA)

On 9/9/2018 4:01 PM, wrote:
On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 5:25:13 PM UTC-7, AMuzi wrote:
On 9/6/2018 6:34 PM,
wrote:
On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 9:03:22 AM UTC-7, Radey Shouman wrote:
Frank Krygowski writes:

On 9/6/2018 2:35 AM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 12:54:44 AM UTC-4, Tim McNamara wrote:
On Wed, 5 Sep 2018 12:41:29 -0700 (PDT), Sir Ridesalot
wrote:

Where I am there's virtually no talk about MANDATORY helmet laws.
However many motorists and BICYCLISTS would like to see bicyclists
licensed so t hat they can fined or charged whenever they hit someone
or do something stupid and illegal that causes or nearly causes a
vehicular accident involving a motor vehicle or other bicyclist. The

Bicyclists can already be charged for violating the law in all 50 states
in the US. No licensing necessary. Bicyclists (and others) may not be
charged for stupidity, on the other hand, because being stupid is not
against the law- unless said stupidity leads to breaking the law.

Also, many here want to see electric scooters/pedal bikes licensed too
since so many people using them totally disregard rules of the road
and city bylawas as to where such things can be ridden.

And yet a plurality if not majority of motor vehicle operators that I
see every day violate some law or other while I am watching- speeding,
changing lanes without signaling, driving while distracted, driving out
of the designated lane, speeding, failing to stop for stop signs and
traffic signals, speeding, nonfunctioning head/taillights, speeding,
etc., etc., etc. Licensing clearly does not result in compliance with
the law and, at least in my state, no actual competence to operate a
motor vehicle in traffic is required to get a license. All licensing
seems to do is create a false notion of accountability. Take people's
licenses away and they just drive without one.

What people here want is a means to identify bicyclists/bicycle
who/that leave the scene. Thus the wish for bicycle licenses.

There are countless cases of motorists leaving the scene of an
accident, usually followed by reports like "The driver was in a black
SUV. It may have some front end damage. Anyone with information should
call the local police..." There's almost never mention of a license
plate number, probably because they're so difficult to read quickly
and not easy to remember.

Now extrapolate to a license plate on a bicycle. How easily would it
be seen? How often would it make a difference?

We live in a brave new world, in which cameras that can read and
recognize license plates are sprinkled all over the landscape. This
allows governments to keep track of our movements in way that would have
been impossible not even a few years ago. Bicycle license plates would
allow the same benevolent oversight for cyclists as it does for
motorists.

Once facial recognition software is ready for prime time
pedestrians will enjoy the same benefits.

License plate readers are both rare and not very effective. There is virtually NO WAY that facial recognition would work. This is the real world and not NCIS.


Earth to Tom! Hello - ?? It's 2018 here.

Local automated license readers spot stolen cars here
regularly and facial recognition has gone mainstream:
https://www.iheart.com/content/2018-...gal-immigrant/


Andrew - Remember - I am an electronics engineer. I design these sorts of things and actually know how they are constructed and programmed. Can you say the same?

There is an entire world of difference between a license plate reader designed to identify a plate that is DESIGNED to be clearly visible and "Facial recognition" when entire racial groups can have almost identical main features. No matter WHAT you saw on NCIS these programs are only available to the strongest possible computers in the world. They will NOT run on mine and my desktop is among the top 1% in power in the entire world.


Neither can the airport system - these are cloud-driven
systems. One only needs a link, just as the cameras in City
owned vehicles (Police cruisers & parking enforcement,
garbage trucks and city staff cars) identify stolen plates
while driving around, always linked albeit with limited
computer power in the vehicle.



--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971


  #37  
Old September 10th 18, 01:16 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Andre Jute[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 10,422
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW (IN THE UNITED STATESOF AMERICA)

On Sunday, September 9, 2018 at 10:28:15 PM UTC+1, wrote:
On Friday, September 7, 2018 at 5:45:53 PM UTC-7, jbeattie wrote:
On Friday, September 7, 2018 at 5:10:36 PM UTC-7, Andre Jute wrote:
On Saturday, September 8, 2018 at 1:01:00 AM UTC+1, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 9/7/2018 3:42 PM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
On Thursday, September 6, 2018 at 9:42:25 PM UTC-4, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 9/5/2018 3:41 PM, Sir Ridesalot wrote:


Where I am there's virtually no talk about MANDATORY helmet laws.

IIRC, you're somewhere in Ontario. There's virtually no talk about
mandatory helmet laws there specifically because a group of cyclists -
including one who used to post here - successfully argued against them.
You should thank those cyclists for your freedom of choice.

BTW, a few years ago my wife and I did a driving and camping trip to
Cape Breton. While in a tiny town in New Brunswick, on a zero-traffic
Sunday evening, we rode our bikes a few blocks to a restaurant and back.
We were stopped on a residential street by a local cop and told that
helmets were mandatory for all ages everywhere in Canada. She was wrong,
of course. Yes, they are mandatory for all ages in NB and we knew that;
but we didn't even bring them along.

You'd be subject to the same nonsense if not for people you've argued
against.

--
- Frank Krygowski

Please show me where I argued against peoplec opposed to mandatory laws.

OK, Sir. You've obviously argued against me. You resurrected one of your
arguments just two days ago, starting with "Say that on this newsgroup
and within a post or two our resident anti-helmet poster will attack you
quite strongly." Was that not directed at me? If not me, it might have
been Tom.

Both Tom and I have argued against mandatory helmet laws, and we've
given reasons why. You've argued against us and argued against our
reasons. Therefore you you HAVE argued against people opposed to
mandatory helmet laws.

And I repeat: If not for the efforts of some of those same people, you'd
be subject to a MHL right now, just like the cyclists in New Brunswick.

--
- Frank Krygowski

Seems to me, Ridealot, that you're entitled to an apology the moment Krygowski fails to prove his lie that you are a cyclist sell-out to Big Helmet -- as he has failed to prove his lie: he accused you of arguing against *Canadian* anti-helmet campaigners but, now that you've stood up to him and demanded proof of his lie, suddenly Krygowski and Tom are standing in for Canadians, and by a tenuous leap of poor faith at that. It's crap, and cheap, transparent crap at that, not even worthy of a junior school debate.

Of course you won't get an apology, because Krygowski is far too smug (or more likely malicious) ever to admit he made a mistake. What you'll get is just more of the same ad hominem abuse from Krygowski.


Damn you again BIG HELMET! Can't you see, Andre, that BIG HELMET is tearing us apart -- pitting brother against brother? Cast off BIG HELMET! Free your head. Free your mind. We must all join arms, bare headed, riding together as one . . . into a giant crash. Do'h. I hit my head. It's really hard to ride arm-in-arm, unless you're the Sky Team. https://i.eurosport.com/2016/07/24/1...70-640-360.jpg

To listen to this drivel, you would think the Huns were massed on the border waiting to invade and enslave our heads. Wait until the electric scooters make it to Ohio, then Frank will have something real to complain about.

-- Jay Beattie.


I think that Andre doesn't understand sarcasm.


Hallelujah. Just what I say every time some snowflake in a trembly voice calls me a sarcastic SOB. In future I'll refer them to you, Tom, for an authoritative answer: Andre is not sarcastic.

Hey Andre, are you an American?


Thank god, no. I like Americans, but I couldn't eat a whole one.

Andre Jute
Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit
  #38  
Old September 10th 18, 01:52 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Andre Jute[_2_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 10,422
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW (IN THE UNITED STATESOF AMERICA)

On Sunday, September 9, 2018 at 10:26:35 PM UTC+1, wrote:
On Friday, September 7, 2018 at 10:17:26 AM UTC-7, AMuzi wrote:
On 9/7/2018 10:54 AM, Andre Jute wrote:
On Friday, September 7, 2018 at 2:26:02 PM UTC+1, AMuzi wrote:

Indeed, in a related issue the winning phrase was, "Let
those who ride decide."


That could be the motto of old-fashioned capital L liberals like me.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sd-XHD_GuM



Andre Jute
How those intolerant thugs can call themselves liberals is entirely beyond me


Intolerant thugs? Harley riders are more likely union
welders, machinists or truck drivers than trailer trash.

http://www.latimes.com/business/auto...825-story.html


Hardly thugs. Sonny Barger whom I knew was an author of a number of books.. He was also an actor with more movies to his name than most famous actors..

Many of the Hells Angels club were quite educated. It grew from being a club to being a gang a lot later than you would expect and the first crimes they got into were little more than drunken fights with drunken farmworkers.. Who would you think would be at fault - Roger's son or some invading motorcycle club?


Hmm. I must have been in the wrong thread when I wrote that sig line. I am hardly likely to call Hell's Angels names. I was once a motorcyclist myself, and I was a vice-president of my local (at the time) Angels. They never mentioned that my Laverda (a 350 at the time) was a bit sissy. The trailer-load of beer I had delivered every month may have had something to do with both my election and their good manners.

You're right, they weren't a criminal gang, just guys who liked big bikes. One was a bank teller, another was a senior retail manager in a big chain, I was in advertising, and so on. There were also the usual blue-collar workers, including a couple of blasting captains from the gold mines who used to bring me dynamite to melt down into nitro at our barbecues, when we'd blow up whatever was to hand. For years I wore a policeman's cap I lifted off his head one night when the boys got a bit playful. Also, in Australia, where my parties for my 400 closest friends were likely to be crashed by the supporters of a rival football team, I always hired the Angels as chuckers-out.

Years later, when I had a much more respectable and larger Laverda which I kept at our office in Germany where they have fabulous B roads and many small towns with excellent opera houses, I rode out a couple of times with the Dykes on Bikes at the invitation of a girl who worked with me who was a member.

Andre Jute
How to make friends and influence people
  #39  
Old September 10th 18, 06:09 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
James[_8_]
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Posts: 6,153
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW 
(IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA)

IF mandatory helmets law could save those lives, but it puts off a large
portion of the cycling public from cycling at all (50% of school aged
teens stopped riding with the introduction of the mandatory helmet law
in Australia), the health benefits those miss out on may negate the
benefit of the law.

But more importantly, _if_ the least most effective hazard control in
the Hierarchy Of Controls, personal protective equipment (PPE) has the
potential to save so many lives, just imagine how many more could be
saved by the implementation of the most effective control - safe
infrastructure that eliminates hazards altogether, or at least minimises
the likelihood of conflict and injury?

Hell, our drivers are not even taught how to safely operate their
vehicle around vulnerable road users. That's further down the Hierarchy
Of Controls, but still more effective than PPE.

In Australia and NZ, where mandatory helmet laws have been around since
1991 (27 years ago), the proponents of mandatory helmet laws are *still*
fixated on defending the law and on proving the efficacy of helmets.
(E.g. Prof. Raphael Grzebieta and Associate Prof. Jake Olivier)

These so called road safety experts have *barely* made an effort to
change the way roads are built, such that cyclists are insulated from
high speed car traffic, that car traffic is made less convenient and
that cyclists are only mixing it with car traffic on low speed streets.

The National Cycling Participation Survey found;
"While bicycle ownership has remained steady in comparison to the 2011
National Cycling Participation Survey, there has been a statistically
significant decrease in the level of cycling participation in Australia
between 2011 and 2017."

Meanwhile the police continue their blitzes on cyclists, focusing on
whether the rider is wearing a helmet (the fine in the state of New
South Wales is something like $330AUD), and whether the bicycle is
fitted with a bell. Yes, a bell is a mandatory piece of equipment on a
bicycle in Australia. Thankfully I have *never* been stopped by the
police for a bicycle road worthiness check, but not wearing a helmet is
like displaying a beacon that reads "Stop me!", and I don't dare ride
without a helmet because I don't like fines or police attention.

--
JS

On 06/09/18 00:42, Andre Jute wrote:
THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW

(IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA)


by Andre Jute

It is a risible myth that your average American is a tall-walking free 
individual untrammeled by government: he is in fact just as much 
constricted as a European soft-socialist consumerist or Japanese 
collective citizen, though it is true that the American is controlled 
in different areas of his activity than the European or the Japanese. 
To some the uncontrolled areas of American life, for instance the 
ability to own and use firearms, smacks of barbarism rather than 
liberty. In this article I examine whether the lack of a mandatory 
bicycle helmet law in the USA is barbaric or an emanation of that 
rugged liberty more evident in rhetoric than reality.

Any case for intervention by the state must be made on moral and 
statistical grounds. Examples are driving licences, crush zones on 
cars, seatbelts, age restrictions on alcohol sales, and a million 
other interventions, all now accepted unremarked in the States as part 
of the regulatory landscape, but all virulently opposed in their day.

HOW DANGEROUS IS CYCLING?

Surprisingly, cycling can be argued to be "safe enough", given only 
that one is willing to count the intangible benefits of health through 
exercise, generally acknowledged as substantial. Here I shall make no 
effort to quantify those health benefits because the argument I'm 
putting forward is conclusively made by harder statistics and 
unexceptional general morality.

In the representative year of 2008, the last for which comprehesive 
data is available, 716 cyclists died on US roads, and 52,000 were 
injured.

Source: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

The most convenient way to grasp the meaning of these statistics is to 
compare cycling with motoring, the latter ipso facto by motorists' 
average mileage accepted by most Americans as safe enough.

Compared to a motorist a cyclist is:

11 times MORE likely to die PER MILE travelled 

2.9 times MORE likely to die PER TRIP taken

By adding information about the relative frequency/length/duration of 
journeys of cyclists and motorists, we can further conclude that in 
the US:

Compared to a motorist, a cyclist is:

3 to 4 times MORE likely to die PER HOUR riding 

3 to 4 times LESS likely to die IN A YEAR's riding

Source: 
http://www.google.com/url?sa=D&q=htt...ite/Banco/7man...

It is the last number, that the average cyclist is 3 to 4 times less 
likely to die in a year's riding than a motorist, and enjoys all the 
benefits of healthy exercise, that permits us to ignore the greater 
per mile/per trip/per hour danger.

This gives us the overall perspective but says nothing about wearing a 
cycling helmet.

HELMET WEAR AT THE EXTREME END OF CYCLING RISK
What we really want to know is: what chance of the helmet saving your 
life? The authorities in New York made a compilation covering the 
years 1996 to 2003 of all the deaths (225) and serious injuries 
(3,462) in cycling accidents in all New York City. The purpose of the 
study was an overview usable for city development planning, not helmet 
advocacy, so helmet usage was only noted for part of the period among 
the seriously injured, amounting to 333 cases.

Here are some 
conclusions:
• Most fatal crashes (74%) involved a head injury.
fatal crashes, but 13% in non-fatal 
crashes
Source: 
http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/download...ike-report.pdf
This concatenation of facts suggests very strongly that not wearing a 
helmet may be particularly dangerous.
• It looks like wearing a helmet saved roundabout 33 cyclists or so 
(of the 333 seriously injured for whom helmet use is known) from 
dying.

• If those who died wore helmets at the same rate of 13% as those in 
the study who survived, a further 22 or so could have lived. 

• If all the fatalities had been wearing a helmet (100%), somewhere 
between 10% and 57% of them would have lived. This number is less firm 
to allow for impacts so heavy that no helmet would have saved the 
cyclist. Still, between 22 and 128 *additional* (to the 33 noted 
above) New Yorkers alive rather than dead for wearing a thirty buck 
helmet is a serious statistical, moral and political consideration 
difficult to overlook.

SO HOW MANY CYCLISTS CAN HELMETS SAVE ACROSS THE NATION? 
New York is not the United States but we're not seeking certainly, 
only investigating whether a moral imperative for action appears.

First off, the 52,000 cyclists hurt cannot be directly related to the 
very serious injuries which were the only ones counted in the New York 
compilation. But a fatality is a fatality anywhere and the fraction of 
head injuries in the fatalities is pretty constant.

So, with a caution, we can say that of 716 cycling fatalities 
nationwide, helmet use could have saved at least 70 and very likely 
more towards a possible upper limit of around 400. Again the 
statistical extension must be tempered by the knowledge that some 
impacts are so heavy that no helmet can save the cyclist. Still, if 
even half the impacts resulting in fatal head trauma is too heavy for 
a helmet to mitigate, possibly around 235 cyclists might live rather 
than die on the roads for simply wearing a helmet. Every year. That's 
an instant reduction in cyclist road fatalities of one third. Once 
more we have arrived at a statistical, moral and political fact that 
is hard to igno Helmet wear could save many lives.

THE CASE AGAINST MANDATORY HELMET LAWS
• Compulsion is anti-Constitutional, an assault on the freedom of the 
citizen to choose his own manner of living and dying 

• Many other actitivities cause fatal head injuries. So why not insist 
they should all be put in helmets? 

• 37% of bicycle fatalities involve alcohol, and 23% were legally 
drunk, and you'll never get these drunks in helmets anyway 

• We should leave the drunks to their fate; they're not real cyclists 
anyway 
• Helmets are not perfect anyway

• Helmets cause cyclists to stop cycling, which is a cost to society 
in health losses 

• Many more motorists die on the roads than cyclists. Why not insist 
that motorists wear helmets inside their cars?

• Helmets don't save lives -- that's a myth put forward by commercial 
helmet makers 

• Helmets are too heavily promoted 

• Helmet makers overstate the benefits of helmets 

• A helmet makes me look like a dork 

• Too few cyclists will be saved to make the cost worthwhile

THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY HELMET LAW IN THE STATES

• 235 or more additional cyclists' lives saved 

• 716 deaths of cyclists on the road when a third or more of those 
deaths can easily be avoided is a national disgrace

• Education has clearly failed 

• Anti-helmet zealots in the face of the evidence from New York are 
still advising cyclists not to wear helmets 

• An example to the next generation of cyclists

• A visible sign of a commitment to cycling safety, which may attract 
more people to cycling

© Copyright Andre Jute 2010. Free for reproduction in non-profit 
journals and sites as long as the entire article is reproduced in full 
including this copyright and permission notice.


  #40  
Old September 10th 18, 09:56 AM posted to rec.bicycles.tech
Sepp Ruf
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 454
Default THE CASE FOR A MANDATORY CYCLE HELMET LAW 
(IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA)

James wrote:

The National Cycling Participation Survey found;
"While bicycle ownership has remained steady in comparison to the 2011
National Cycling Participation Survey, there has been a statistically
significant decrease in the level of cycling participation in Australia
between 2011 and 2017."

Meanwhile the police continue their blitzes on cyclists, focusing on
whether the rider is wearing a helmet (the fine in the state of New
South Wales is something like $330AUD), and whether the bicycle is
fitted with a bell. Yes, a bell is a mandatory piece of equipment on a
bicycle in Australia.


Any mounting prescriptions?
https://static.lindt.com.au/fileadmin/_processed_/csm_Picnic_Hamper_a197158b87.jpg
(In Joergville, it's also useful against hungry springtime bears: Just hurl
the partially unwrapped part at the attacking beast!)

Thankfully I have *never* been stopped by the
police for a bicycle road worthiness check, but not wearing a helmet is
like displaying a beacon that reads "Stop me!", and I don't dare ride
without a helmet because I don't like fines or police attention.


Sounds suspiciously like an Enemy of the State.
 




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